March 5 1974
With Mr Harold Wilson’s return to Downing Street last night it was confidently expected that the new Prime Minister will name Mr Merlyn Rees as Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, replacing Mr Francis Pym.
Mr Rees has been Labour’s spokesman on Northern Ireland during their term in Opposition. The SDLP Leader, Mr Gerry Fitt, is to have talks with him today in London on the internment issue, a subject he will again raise with officials at the Northern Ireland Office.
Internment was discussed between Mr Wilson and Mr Fitt yesterday, with the latter telling the premier that this was still the burning issue here.
Mr Fitt pledged his support to the new Labour Government and said he would be keeping Mr Wilson in close touch with the real state of affairs in the north.
Earlier Mr Wilson joined Labour MPs in welcoming Mr Fitt back to Westminster to represent the West Belfast constituency. Mr Fitt expects Mr Wilson to receive an SDLP delegation very soon to discuss internment.
With Harold Wilson’s minority Labour government replacing Ted Heath’s Tories at Downing Street, personnel changed in the Northern Ireland Office too with Merlyn Rees replacing Francis Pym as Secretary of State.
Two from North Killed in Plane Disaster
At least two of the victims of the Paris air disaster, in which 346 people died, came from Northern Ireland. They were named yesterday as 44-year-old Mrs Diana Connelly, Carnmoney Road, Glengormley, and Mr Desmond Hunt, Edgcumbe Gardens, Holywood Road, Belfast. They were both returning from short holidays in Turkey.
Mr Hunt, who was also in his forties, was a clerk in the Accountant-General’s office in the Hight Court, where he had worked for the past 25 years. He went on a package tour to Turkey at the end of last week.
Mrs Connelly, a shorthand typist at Northern Ireland Carriers in Belfast, was on her way home after a five-day holiday in Istanbul when the Turkish DC10 crashed into a wooded slope outside Paris after a mid-air explosion.